Some Activists Want Zimbabwe’s President Arrested Over Genocide, Murder

(AFRICAN EXAMINER) – Some civil activists are pushing a petition to invoke the International Court of Justice to arrest and charge Zimbabwe President Emmerson Mnangagwa for genocide, murder, rape and torture.

A petition that has been started on Change.org and initiated by United States based Mark Patrick Themann seeks to gather 1500 signatures to force the ICC to try Mnangagwa.

The petition is titled “Demand an international criminal court trial for Emmerson Mnangagwa” and is getting more and more responses by each day.

“Emmerson Mnangagwa who is the President of Zimbabwe should be tried in the International Court of Justice for his role in Gukurahundi which was genocide committed against the Ndebele people, the murder of members of the MDC Alliance that he organized on June, 27 2008 and the murder, rape and torture that the government of Zimbabwe has committed,” reads part of the petition.

Mnangagwa was minister of State Security during Gukurahundi genocide of the 1980s where more than 20,000 Ndebele speaking people from Matabeleland and Midlands were reportedly butchered.

The era has remained a thorny in the flesh and a cause for lack of unity between Ndebeles and majority Shona’s and it manifests itself in schools, workplaces, churches and other gatherings.

There is widespread belief Mnangagwa was chief enforcer of the genocide.

Over the weekend he met traditional leaders from Matabeleland over the Gukurahundi issue where he pledged to deal with it but said it is the traditional leaders who should drive the exhumations and reburials of victims.

There is a push from families of victims for government to exhume and rebury thousands of people who were killed by government of former president Robert Mugabe.

Scores of Zimbabweans have joined the petition drive.

One identified as Clever Gwara said: “Emmerson Mnangagwa is a dangerous criminal. All his offshore accounts in and out of Zimbabwe should be forfeited and brought back to Zimbabwe to develop our infrastructure.”

Another citizen Peter Mupondi said: “I am signing this because I wanted Emmerson Mnangagwa to appear and answer his human rights abuse and killings at the international criminal court.”